Brooklyn's Christening

Brooklyn's Christening was today. We were the only family there for a baptism, which was odd, but also nice since Jackson and Megan were incapable of sitting still through the service. To be fair, they were both really good during mass, and the baptism was after mass, so they were DONE sitting still and being quiet.
Anyway, Brooklyn wore the family gown we have all worn. It's amazing how many people have been baptized in it since it was made. My grandmother and great grandmother made the gown back in 1948 for my Dad's older sister, and since then everyone in the family has been baptized in it. I love that we have this piece of history that we have all shared in.
Brooklyn received two very special gifts today. One, from her Godmother, was a beautiful bracelet that Brooklyn wore today on her ankle, and came with a card with a saying that when she gets married it can be used as a charm on her garter. It is gorgeous and I will definitely have to share a picture of it and the little card that came with it. The other super special gift was from my mom, and it was a little handmade bonnet that you can clip a couple of threads on, and it becomes a handkerchief for her to carry on her wedding day. I absolutely love this gift idea, and it came with the sweetest poem too.
Happy Christening Day Brooklyn!

and a picture of all the monsters.


oh, and at her two month checkup Brooklyn was up to 12 pounds, and is 23 inches long. She gained 1.5 pounds, and grew 2 inches in one month. Keep on growing girl!

Brooklyn is 2 months old

It's unreal that Brooklyn has been part of our family for 2 months now, and yet it also feels like she's always been here. I think the more kids you have, the easier it is to adjust to another baby, so you don't notice the change as much. That doesn't mean we don't love her a ton, and love having her as part of our family though. She is a really great baby. She sleeps well at night, and usually eats around midnight, and then sleeps until anywhere between 5 and 7, just depending on the day. She sleeps with us though, so when she does wake up, I just start feeding her in bed, and we both falls back asleep pretty quickly. Gotta love that part of co-sleeping. :) She is also a very smiley and chatty baby, which shouldn't surprise me with as much as everyone else in the family talks. She loves to be snuggled, which is great since everyone loves a snuggly baby.
We are already trying to get Brooklyn used to how much we travel. We have taken two trips to Cloud 9 since she arrived, and she did ok on them. She cried a lot on the way home on our most recent trip, but once we reached a stopping point, we discovered she had a majorly poopy diaper, so I think that was the cause of her distress. Once she was changed and fed, she went back to sleep for the rest of the trip. Still to come this year will be at least one more trip to Cloud 9, a trip to Ohio, a trip to Chicago, and I'm sure we'll end up with at least one more road trip to somewhere, so hopefully she'll continue to travel well.
Brooklyn has her two month check-up tomorrow, so I'll update with her weight after that. I'm sure she's doing just fine though. Also coming up this weekend is Brooklyn's christening, which I'm really excited about. I must go for now and work on cleaning house for our guests following the Christening. I'm still not caught up, and fear I never will be.

Big Fatty fattness

That's how I feel right now. I want to punch every first time mom who popped out a baby and a week later slipped their pre-pregnancy pants on effortlessly. I will be honest and admit that I have never been able to fit back into my pre-Emma clothes. NOPE, not EVER! After having Emma I lost all but about 10 pounds right away, and that's where my body stayed until I got pregnant with Nathan. With Nathan I gained a lot more weight, so I had more to lose, and of course, never got off my lazy butt to lose all of it. After Megan I got back to my pre-pregnancy weight quickly, but I still had a lot more to lose. I did great losing the weight, but even getting the numbers on the scale back to where they were before I got pregnant with Emma, I was unable to wear the same size. Seriously, when I got pregnant with Emma I wore a size 5 or 7 depending on the clothes. After Megan and I lost all the weight, the best I could do in pants was a 10. I was super stoked when for Laura's wedding I got to order a size 8 dress, and it fit perfectly, but seriously a size 8 in pants just wasn't happening.
After all that I got pregnant with Jackson and I gained a lot that pregnancy (something about those boys I guess), and after having him I lost a lot easily, but then stalled with a decent amount left to lose, and I never made myself do the work to lose it all. When he was 9 months old I got pregnant again and swore I was not going to gain a ton of weight. My body doesn't like to listen though, and I still gained about 35 pounds, even though I should only have gained 15 since I was overweight to begin with. (Weird note here that I really did gain about 35 with all three girls, and about 50 with both boys. I find it odd that happened and wonder if I'm the only one like that)
Anyway, now that Brooklyn is 7 weeks old, and I am still hovering around that initial 20 pound loss that I achieved after about 2 weeks, I'm disgusted at myself. I hate how I look in clothes, and in swimwear, and especially in my birthday suit. I am still wearing maternity pants and shorts because not even my "fat" clothes fit me right now.
The image in my head of how I should look, definitely does not match how I really look. I feel bad for my husband that this is definitely not the person he met, fell in love with, and married. I cannot believe that I graduated high school wearing a size 1 jeans (admittedly that was too skinny though and I looked sick), and here I am almost 10 years later and I am this huge person now.
So, a change is coming. It will not happen overnight, or all at once, and I will not be the perfect picture of health and fitness, but I will be better.
Stay tuned for more of my journey. :)

Worst Blogger Ever

If there were an award for this, I think I might win. Granted I have some good excuses; 5 kids, a new baby, and being out of town, but still, this is ridiculous!
Here's a quick rundown on recent events (I promise my blog will not turn into one post a month of a bulleted catch up entry, lol!)

-June 12th, Brooklyn had her two week checkup, at which point she was 9 pounds 1 ounce
-That same day, we went to my cousin's wedding. She was a beautiful bride, and despite the rain, it was a fantastic day.
-At Brooklyn's one month checkup she was 10 pounds 7.5 ounces. What a chunker!
-Nathan had his 6 year checkup, and he's doing great. Still on the smaller end for kids his age, but still just fine.
-Jackson had his 18 month checkup, and he is finally back on the growth chart. First percentile for weight and Second for height, but at least he's on the chart now. lol!
-We went to Cloud 9 for the first time this year. Sean's dad, brother and his family, and sister all came as well, so it was fun to have them all together. We intended to stay 12 days, but cut it a few days short. The heat was a lot for the two little ones, which led to me spending lots of time just sitting around with them in the camper, and I was going crazy.
-Once home Sean took the three oldest bowling one day, we went to the zoo and out for ice cream the next, and then swimming at my mom's the next day.
- The older three stayed at my mom's for two nights, and came home exhausted. They love being over there, but they refuse to let themselves slow down at all, so they are always wiped out when they come back home.
-Brooklyn is doing really well. She sleeps at night, and is even going for stretches longer than 3 hours at night, which is awesome. During the day she doesn't like to nap anywhere but in my arms, which means our house is being severely neglected.
But as the last few lines of a great poem go:
"The cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow
But children grow up as I’ve learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down cobwebs; Dust go to sleep!
I’m rocking my baby and babies don’t keep."

laura's version

Laura wrote up her account of Brooklyn's birthday, and gave me permission to share it with everyone, so here it is. Her times are different from mine in places, but I have a feeling hers are more accurate since I pieced together the timeline from texts on Sean's phone. (hey, I was in labor, I didn't pay attention to the clock after about 3pm, lol!)

I thought you might want to hear a fly on the wall’s perspective of the birth of Brooklyn! I know you already wrote her birth story – but I obviously had a different point of view since I wasn’t the one going through any of the pain!

Months ago Cheryl had asked me if I wanted to be in the delivery room when their baby was born – there was no way I was going to miss that opportunity! I had been keeping up with Cheryl’s progress, and had been trying to stay really on top of things at work so that if she went into labor it wouldn’t be a big deal for me to miss a day of work. Friday afternoon Cheryl had given me an update of her doctor’s appointment, and had said that there wasn’t much change from the week before. With Cheryl’s history of having to be induced, I figured there would be no action this weekend. Boy, was I wrong!

I had big plans over the Memorial Day weekend to paint my bedroom and hallway since my DH was working every day. Friday night I went to Lowe’s and bought all my paint supplies, then ran a few other errands and went home to start painting. At about midnight I finished painting both the ceilings. By that time my DH was home from work, and we stayed up until about 2am watching TV, and went to bed.

A little after 8:00 Saturday morning, our house phone rang. Since my MIL has a habit of calling our house early on the weekends, I didn’t get up to answer it because I figured it was her. Then my cell phone rang (which was by my bed), and it was Cheryl. I didn’t even say hello – I just picked up the phone and said, “Are you in labor?!” I was so excited! Cheryl told me that her water had broken and they were getting ready to leave for the hospital. She told me to take my time getting ready, and to eat breakfast because it was going to be a long day. I packed up a few things I might want during the day, got ready, and left - I was trying to take my time, but I couldn’t help thinking what if it goes faster than she planned and I miss it?! I got to the hospital at about 9:45, and went up to labor and delivery. Cheryl was still in a triage room getting all checked in – her mom arrived a little after me, and we all helped her get settled into her room once they moved her. I stayed with Cheryl while her mom and Sean went to get the rest of their things out of the car. After that, we all just sat in the room for a while. Cheryl was feeling pretty good at this point, and the contractions weren’t too strong. They had given her a little pitocin to get things moving a little more consistently, but she really wasn’t in too much pain…yet.

We all decided to leave for a bit while the nurse came in and checked Cheryl’s progress, and she was going to get an epidural before the pain got too bad to sit through it. We just sat in the waiting room and made some phone calls – this is also the point at which I discovered the blue kool-aid slushies that they had on the floor (I might need to get a machine for my house). I drank one while we waited. After a little while I went back in Cheryl’s room – the anesthesiologist was finishing up with the epidural – after she left, I sat with Cheryl while her mom and Sean ran to grab something to eat, and I decided to get another slushie. At about 3:00 the nurse checked her again and she was between 4-5 cm. She had felt a little window of pain on her lower left side that the epidural hadn’t reached, so she had been trying to lay on her left side to run the medicine down that way. That had worked until she switched to the right side, the pain on her left came back. Even though she again switched to her left side, the pain never subsided for her again.

Around 3:30 I was on a sugar high from all the slushies, and decided I probably needed some food. I ran to get something to eat with Cheryl’s mom – I think her mom was having a hard time being in the room, so she was trying to keep herself occupied! We got back up to the room at about 4:00, and Cheryl had started to experience a lot of pain. That little window of pain from before was growing, and Cheryl had started lightly moaning through most of the contractions. The nurse checked her again at about 4:30 and said that she was between 5 and 6 cm. The nurse called Cheryl’s on call doctor (since her normal OB was out of town), and also called the anesthesiologist back to see if she could do anything else for the pain. She gave Cheryl what she said was the dose the she would give for a C-Section, and said to give it about five minutes to work. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to help at all, and Cheryl was obviously in a lot of pain, moaning through all the contractions. We all just sat in the room with the lights dim, and Sean was holding Cheryl’s hand trying to help her through the contractions. I didn’t want to be in the way, so I really just sat there at this point watching her try to manage the pain. The anesthesiologist came back and tried to move the epidural up thinking that might help – the only other option was to get a new epidural put in, and Cheryl wasn’t really in a state of mind to think about that. Unfortunately, moving the epidural didn’t work, either. The nurse thought that since she had been experiencing so much pain, and since Cheryl had warned her that once she gets to 6cm that she generally goes pretty fast, that she may have made more progress and checked her again. This was a little before 5:00 and she was at 8 cm.

At this point, I took it upon myself to get in touch with the photographer to make sure that she would be there on time. Cheryl had wanted to have this birth photographed, and since I couldn’t take any of the pain away, I really wanted to make sure that the photographer was there. Sean was so focused on Cheryl, that he couldn’t really think about this part of it either, so I grabbed Sean’s phone and went out to the hall to call Kristen and tell her that Cheryl was at 8cm and progressing fast and that she may want to come up as soon as possible.

I went back into the room, and the doctor had arrived, took one look at Cheryl and went to change his clothes. By the time the doctor came back in, Cheryl only had a lip of cervix left. Things started to move quickly to get things in order – they were dropping the bottom part of the bed down, and pulling up the stirrups. I grabbed Sean’s phone again and texted Kristen to tell her that Cheryl was about to start pushing – this was at about 5:15. I was on Cheryl’s right side, holding her hand, and one of her legs to help her push. Sean was trying to encourage Cheryl at one point, but she was in so much pain that she just yelled at him to SHUT-UP! I was really glad I wasn’t the one that was talking! The nurse grabbed one of Cheryl’s legs and put it in the stirrup and she yelled to not move her because it hurt! The nurse told her, “I know it hurts, but I have to do this so you can get this baby out and feel better.” Cheryl’s legs were both in the stirrups and she had another contraction. Cheryl yelled that she was pushing because she couldn’t help it. The doctor said that’s ok, go ahead a push. A little bit of the head came out on that push. At this point Kristen came running into the room with her camera snapping away! I was so glad that she was there and that Cheryl would get the pictures that she wanted! The next contraction Cheryl pushed again and got the whole head out. One more push and the entire body came out. The doctor flipped the baby over, and Sean announced that it was a girl. I had to hold back tears – it was such an amazing moment. They announced the name Brooklyn, and put her on Cheryl’s chest.

A few minutes later they took Brooklyn over to the warmer and were cleaning her off, and getting Cheryl situated. She had no tearing on the outside, and none that they could see on the inside, but she wouldn’t stop bleeding. It was a little scary, since Cheryl’s blood pressure dropped pretty low, and her pulse was really high. They gave her a shot of something in the leg, and kept massaging her stomach to get her uterus to contract and try to stop the bleeding. Cheryl kept asking what her stats were, and then would ask about the baby since she wasn’t crying much. Brooklyn was perfect, and happy, but I’m sure Cheryl was just worried about her since she needed to be focused on herself. Eventually the blood stopped, and they got Cheryl all situated, but she was feeling sick and dizzy, and didn’t feel like she could hold Brooklyn enough to nurse her. The nurse brought her some crackers, and I took the opportunity to hold Brooklyn while Cheryl ate. Eventually Cheryl felt good enough to nurse at around 6:30 – and Brooklyn latched on like a champ! I stayed at the hospital for a little while longer, but decided to leave so Sean and Cheryl could get some rest. I was exhausted from all the excitement of the day, so I can’t imagine how exhausted Cheryl was!

I am so thankful that Sean and Cheryl allowed me to experience the birth of Brooklyn with them! It was seriously one of the most amazing experiences of my life, and taught me so much.

Alive

Yes, we're all still alive. It's been a long 9 days since Brooklyn was born, but I know things could be a lot worse, so I'm trying not to complain. Brooklyn is a really good baby, and she actually sleeps at night. She still wakes every 3 hours, on average, to eat, but at least she's not spending all her awake time when I need to be sleeping like most babies do. I think she is in the midst of her first growth spurt because yesterday she wanted to nurse hourly all afternoon and evening, but I'm glad that did not continue overnight since I was very tired after several very busy days and all the nursing she did.
Sadly, Sean's mom had to leave last Tuesday, but we are so glad she was able to be here when Brooklyn was born both to enjoy her new grand-daughter and to help us out with the other kids. Then Sean went back to work Wednesday afternoon, so all the kids and I are still trying to settle into a routine that allows me to rest, but not leave them bored to death or driving me nuts. Friday I felt really great when I got up, which means of course I way overdid it, and am still paying for it.
Friday night my mom kept the four oldest kids and Sean and I went car shopping. We'd been car shopping for a while, but just couldn't commit to anything yet. Once Brooklyn arrived and we installed all the car seats in the car, it really lit a fire under us to find something bigger soon instead of just waiting for whatever we were waiting for. So we were out very late Friday night looking, and then got up early Saturday morning to go finish the deal. We are now the proud owners of a Yukon XL, which is basically a suburban. I'm excited about all the extra space we have, but incredibly nervous about driving it. I seriously don't think I'll be able to park in a spot at Target at this point, which means Sean is going to have to take me to an empty lot and teach me how so I don't look like a complete moron when I do decide to venture out with all the kids.
Saturday we celebrated Nathan's 6th birthday at my mom's. Yes, I realized I totally spaced on making a post about his birthday this year. Things have just been so crazy. But anyway, we had a small family get together Saturday evening at my mom's house with pizza and cake. Since the kids had stayed the night Friday night, they spent most of the day Saturday in the pool and by the time we got home Saturday night, they were all so exhausted, and so was I.
Sunday the photographer came to the house and took Brooklyn's newborn pictures as well as some of the whole family. I can't wait to see them. I really loved our photographer, and if we were having anymore kids I would definitely be hiring her again to be part of it all. She's fabulous, and takes great pictures! But since we are DONE making babies, I'll just have to settle for hiring her for family pictures as needed.
So there's a quick recap of Brooklyn's first 9 days of life. As always things are hectic in our family, but what else would you expect from a family of 7? Now I just need to figure out how to get the older kids to sleep in because they are still on school time, even though they get to stay up later now.

Oh, and until we get Brooklyn's newborn pics to share, here are the hospital pics to hold you over. Click here

Brooklyn's birth story

Warning, this will contain some graphic info about me and the labor and delivery experience. Also some details may be off slightly since this is just how I remember it and not neccessarily exactly what happened. I know my memory is hazy for parts of the day, but I think I got all the important stuff right. Also this is very long.

WOW, what a day Saturday was! I would love to hear the story told from Sean, my mom, or Laura since they were all there for all of it, and I'm sure what I remember is probably off a little since it was so crazy. Maybe I'll get lucky and can talk one of them into sharing their version (especially Laura). :)

Anyway, I woke up Saturday morning at about 7:30 to pee, this wasn't surprising since I always have to wake up early and go to the bathroom. I laid back down in bed and tossed and turned trying to get comfortable, and then about 7:50 thought I felt what might have been a little trickle of my water breaking. I hadn't heard or felt a pop like I did when my water broke with Megan, but I thought I'd get up and go to the bathroom again and if it was my water, I'd feel more coming out. I went to the bathroom and didn't notice anything else, but Jackson was fussing, so I got him out of bed and brought him into my room and put him on the bed with Sean and half laid down with them. I told Sean I thought maybe my water broke, but I wasn't sure, and as I was laying there, I starting feeling another gush, by the time I got into the bathroom it was running down my legs, and I knew for sure my water had broken. That was between 7:55 and 8:00. I told Sean it was definitely my water, and by then everyone in the house was up. Sean's mom took the kids downstairs to get them started on breakfast, and Sean and I got ready and finished packing my stuff. I called Laura, and Sean called my mom, but we told them both to take their time since I wasn't in any pain or having many contractions, and we were still at home. We got the rest of our stuff together and headed to the hospital.

I couldn't remember if we were supposed to go to the ER to check in, or straight up to the family birthplace. So we stopped at the ER and I told the guy working the desk my water had broken and asked if we should be admitted here, or just go upstairs. He asked if I was having any contractions, and I said a few. So he asked how far apart they were, and when I said I didn't know, he looked at me like I had three heads. I later told Sean if they were painful I'd have paid attention, but it's not like my baby was coming out any minute now, and you'd think the guy would have known that since I was not in any obvious pain. Anyway, he made a call, and said we should just go straight upstairs and they would do everything up there.

When we arrived upstairs they took us to the triage area. That is what they do when they want to make sure you are really in labor, or that your water has really broken. So they gave me a gown and a cup to pee in, and put us in a triage room. The nurse asked a bunch of questions because they couldn't find my info anywhere, and hooked me up to the monitors to check on contractions and the baby. The baby's heart rate was great, and I was contracting, but not often or very strong. Finally the house OB came in to check to see if my water had really broken. I had to laugh because my pants were soaked by the time we got to the hospital, despite wearing a pad, and since I had been sitting in the bed I had been feeling several more gushed of fluid. As soon as the nurse picked up the sheet she realized the ob definitely wouldn't need to verify my water had broken, but he wanted to check to see how dilated I was. I was dilated 3-4 and about 80% effaced, which was some progress from my appointment the day before.

With all that info they gave us a room and called the doctor that was covering for my OB, since my OB was out of town. My mom and Laura had arrived while I was still in the triage room, so they helped us move into my real room and got the rest of our stuff out of the car with Sean. We had left everything out there rather than bring it all in and drag it around until we got settled in our room. The OB said I needed a small dose of pitocin to help regulate things since my body wasn't doing much on it's own, and I really wasn't surprised. I'm pretty sure my body just doesn't get what it's supposed to do, even after my water breaks. So I got my IV started and they drew my blood. I signed a bunch of papers, including the one consenting to an epidural, even though I hadn't made a decision for sure on that. I didn't want to have to sign something for it later when I was in pain should I decide I needed one.

Then the waiting began. It was probably 10:30 or so by the time I got situated in my room and had the pitocin started. I definitely noticed an uptick in the contractions pretty quickly, but they weren't terrible. We all just sat around and talked for a while, and the nurse checked me at about 11:30, and I was only dilated to about 4cm. Everyone else had some lunch and I just enjoyed the quiet and tried to rest. I couldn't really sleep with the contractions, but it was nice just laying there relaxing for a while. The nurse checked me again at 1, and I was still 4cm, and I opted for an epidural at that point. Yes, I totally wimped out again, but honestly, I'm at peace with that decision.

After getting the epidural I felt really good for a while. I had been nauseous all morning, and that went away. The only issue I had was a little "window" on my lower left side that wasn't completely numb, but after laying on my left side for a bit that went away. Then we decided to roll me to the right side to try to move the baby down some more and make some more progress. The nurse checked me again at 3 and I was still only 4-5cm. After being on my right for just a short time, that window of pain came back, and I asked the nurse if I could roll back to my left to get some relief again. She said that was fine, but unfortunately, it didn't help. Not only did that spot not go away, but it was really painful, and the small spot that wasn't numb seemed to be growing.

Things just continued to get more painful and more intense from then on. The spot definitely kept getting bigger, and the contractions were quite painful. The anesthesiologist came in and gave me an extra dose of meds to see if that would help. It did not. So she came back and said she could either try moving the epidural a tiny bit, or give me a whole new one. I said we should just try moving it, so she did that. We waited a few minutes to see if that made a difference, and by that time it was all I could do to get through each contraction, which were about 2 1/2 minutes apart. Having a contraction that was 1 minute long, every 2.5 minutes made me feel very overwhelmed. Once we realized moving the epidural wasn't going to work I couldn't think straight enough to make a decision about getting a new one, so we did nothing.

The nurse had checked me again at 4:30 and I was 5-6cm, but 6cm when I had a contraction. They called the doctor at that point because I had warned everyone once I got to 6, things tend to go fast. At 5:00 I was still at 6cm, and the doctor had arrived. The contractions were so painful at that point I was just laying there holding Sean's hands trying to breathe through them, and could focus on nothing else. I know the OB tried to talk to me, but I have no idea what he was saying. I do remember Sean trying to encourage me and tell me how great I was doing, and all I could do was yell at him to SHUT-UP! I feel bad, but at the time I really needed him to shut-up. I could tune out everyone else, but when Sean talked to me I couldn't focus on breathing through the contractions and everything seemed worse. There were a couple contractions I really felt I couldn't get on top of and was breathing too fast and the nurse kept reminding me to slow down my breathing so I wouldn't hyperventilate. I also found myself moaning through some of the contractions to get through them. I never thought I'd be that vocal in labor since I never was before, but I did whatever I could at that point not to completely lose it.
The doctor came in a little after 5:00 (not sure exactly when) and they finished getting everything ready for delivery. At 5:15 or so, they checked me and I was 8cm. Then at 5:20 (ish) I was complete and ready to push. I pushed a couple times while they were breaking down the the bed, then then threw my legs into the stirrups and I really started pushing. Right after I started pushing my photographer, Kristen, ran into the room and started taking pics of everything. I'm so glad she made it in time. She said she was literally running and couldn't figure out exactly where to go, but someone told her they heard a lady yelling that way (I guess she pointed in the direction of my room), and said Kristen should head over there. Yes, I was the lady that was screaming while I was pushing. I'm kind of embarrassed by that, but I definitely didn't plan it, and didn't feel like I could not do it. At 5:29pm, after just a few pushes, Brooklyn Reese entered the world weighing 8 pounds 11 ounces, and 20 1/4 inches long. Sean announced it was a girl, but with all the craziness he couldn't remember the middle name we had picked out, and I was still not really thinking straight and couldn't help remember either. It was so much harder pushing Brooklyn out than I remember the other kids being, but maybe I just felt it more than I had before. The last couple hours of labor and the delivery were the most pain I've ever been in, and I'm not sure if my epidural was working at all anymore, but if it was working, even a little, that's as close to going natural through labor and delivery as I ever want to get.

Sean cut the cord and they put her up on my chest. She stayed there a few minutes, but then they took her over to the warmer to clean her up. I was fine with them taking her then because I couldn't really focus on anything or even try to hold her right away. The Ob was working on delivering the placenta, which did not want to come out easily. We finally got the placenta out, and then the real fun of me bleeding way too much began. They could not get me to stop bleeding and the poor nurses had to keep massaging my uterus to get it to contract to try to stop the bleeding. The doctor checked me for any internal tears (I didn't tear at all on the outside) to see if that was causing some of the bleeding, but there were none. So the nurses kept working on me, but since they couldn't get it to stop the doc ordered a shot of Methergine to help. I was definitely freaking out because I could see and hear the concern in the nurses voices and faces. I'm sure they were annoyed at me, but I asked a couple of times what my bp was, and at one point it was down really low (like 70 something/50 something), which they told me was still ok. They were more concerned that my heart rate was really high. I also asked if things were ok, and the one nurse said we were still ok, so I asked if she would tell me if I wasn't ok, and she said yes, and at that point I had to trust her on that. Finally after the meds and tons of massaging my uterus the bleeding finally slowed to an acceptable level.

The baby nurse was cleaning Brooklyn off and weighing her and Kristen was taking pics of Brooklyn while they were working on me. I got so wrapped up in my care I had to remind myself to ask how Brooklyn was a couple of times. I knew she was in good hands though, so I figured they'd let me know if she wasn't. Once they finally got the bleeding slowed down and cleaned me up and took my legs out of the stirrups, I felt like crap. The combination of not eating since 10pm the night before, laboring all day, then losing a ton of blood, and having nothing but fluids and meds in me had made me incredibly weak and nauseous. The nurse asked if I wanted to nurse Brooklyn, and I said I knew I needed to, but didn't really feel like I could. They wanted to give me something for the pain I was in (my uterus hurt so bad from all the massaging), but I said I really felt like I needed to eat before I took any more meds or I'd really be sick. So the nurse got me some crackers which I ate slowly, and by 6:30 I finally felt like I was capable of sitting up and holding Brooklyn so she could nurse. I know it was just barely over an hour after she was born, but I felt terrible she had to wait so long to breastfeed for the first time because I was having such a rough time. She did pretty well nursing though, so I don't think it had a major effect on things.

Sunday I was pretty sore all day, and really tired. The ran a blood count on me and said I was pretty anemic, but as long as I wasn't feeling dizzy or having other issues like that, they just wanted me to take it easy and get plenty of rest and iron. I slept a lot Sunday evening after our last visitors left, and then slept decently through the night, of course waking up to nurse Brooklyn as needed. Today I feel remarkably better, though definitely still tired, and my uterus is really sore, especially when Brooklyn nurses. I think it will take me a few days to feel "normal" but I don't feel so exhausted anymore.

Brooklyn is doing really well, and is really getting the hang of nursing. It's been a little harder with her than it was with the other kids, but no major issues. She's such a sweet snugly baby, and I'm so happy to have added another healthy, beautiful baby girl to our family. I'm also thankful and totally ok with this being the last time I have to go through pregnancy and labor and delivery. The scare I got with the excessive bleeding was enough to really convince me we should not have any more kids.

I have to give a big thank you to Sean, my mom, and Laura for being there for me through it all. Even though I yelled at Sean, he was great at supporting me throughout the labor and delivery, as always. Laura had never seen a live birth, but she was fantastic and was right there holding my hand when things were so hard at the end, and held my leg to help me push. What an amazing friend she is! And my poor mom. Saturday was a really hard day for her. Even though she's been there for 4 out of the 5 kids' births, it's still hard for her to watch me be in pain and not be able to do anything. Plus all the excessive bleeding I had really freaked her out, so by the end of the day she was wiped out and definitely needed some rest. Also a huge, giant thank you to Sean's mom for staying with the kids and taking care of the 4 of them completely for the last 3 days. She's amazing and I could not ask for a better mother-in-law.

So it was a crazy, rough day, but it has a happy ending with a healthy baby and mommy, and that's what really matters to me.